


Tame The Ghosts In My Head

by AndreaLyn



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-13
Updated: 2013-01-13
Packaged: 2017-11-25 09:12:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/637333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndreaLyn/pseuds/AndreaLyn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The patient in 21B has earned the name Sleeping Beauty and Steve's learning how to be Prince Charming. </p><p>Future!fic AU in which Danny finds himself in a coma and Steve left the SEALs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tame The Ghosts In My Head

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to casness for the beta! The title comes from "Lovers' Eyes" by Mumford & Sons.

Steve walks onto the floor after a long night and gets handed three times what he’s expecting. He opens his mouth to protest, but the administrator offers him an apologetic shrug. “You’re the only nurse on this floor today,” she says. “Sorry, McGarrett.” She doesn’t have time for him before she’s on to the rest of her work.

Judging from the pile of folders in Steve’s hands, he doesn’t have the time either.

Room 21B is going to have to wait.

Steve lingers with each patient, making sure he gives them the best care he can offer. Today, there’s a little girl recovering from appendicitis, an older man who reminds him of his father who’s been checked in after a bout with the flu (Steve makes a mental note to visit his father after his shift even if he doesn’t have the energy for it), and he finishes his rounds with the usual grunt-work. He adjusts medications, annotates charts, and does the dirty work that doctors don’t think twice about.

Steve thinks about quitting three times a day and going back to the Navy. He’d only ever been a medic, but at least he’d felt a sort of _gratification_ from his work. He’d come home seven years ago when his father suffered a stroke and he’s been in Oahu ever since. He celebrated his fortieth birthday last year and, more than anything, that’s the sign that he’s staying.

He just wishes that he felt like this was home.

The day flies by, but somehow Steve can’t manage to make a dent in his workload. He sees a familiar face lurking outside of 21B, but he doesn’t have time to go and speak to her about the lack of change in the patient’s condition because his pager is buzzing.

 _911_ , it reads.

Of course, seeing as it’s from Mary, that could mean all manner of things. Steve scowls as he stares at it, glancing down the hall and signaling to the girl that he’ll be there in a little while. He slides behind the central nurse’s station and covertly checks over his shoulder before hunkering down with the phone and dialing Mary.

“This better not be about your ex-boyfriend, Mare,” Steve warns. 

“Trust me, if it was about my ex-boyfriend, you’d be getting a call from the cops and not from me,” she says, her voice low and bemused in that disaffected way she perfected when she was sixteen. “It’s about dad. He called me today.”

“Mary…”

“Steve, hear me out. He says that he doesn’t want me to visit.” There, in her tone, is the slightest hint of a quake. Steve could kill their father for making Mary feel like this. “Is there a reason he doesn’t want me there or should I just pretend that I’m seven all over again and dad doesn’t want to see me?”

John’s been going on about how Steve isn’t safe and how Mary should stay on the mainland for her own good. Typically, Steve shuts him down with a curt reminder about how Steve is a former Navy recruit and that he can handle himself. Besides that, he and his sister are long past their childhood days and John McGarrett doesn’t actually have a say. 

“Mare, just come,” Steve says, glancing over his shoulder. Out of the corner of his eye, he catches the motion of someone pacing up and down the hall. “Listen, I’ve got to go. I picked up a double and I’ve got work to do.”

“Is dad going to…”

He’ll feel bad about hanging up on his sister later. Right now, he’s more concerned with the fact that Grace Edwards is pressing her back against the wall, sliding down until she hits the ground. Steve picks up the pace until he’s standing above her. She’s sixteen years old, but Steve met her when she was just fourteen. He doesn’t think he’s ever really _understood_ how bad off he was about his own mother until he’d seen his own feelings of loss and sheer shocked distress mirrored on a teenage girl’s face. 

Grace comes by as often as she can, but life gets in the way. She puts in a solid three nights a week, which is more than most families manage.

“Hey,” Steve says, sitting down beside her carefully. His scrubs pull at his shoulders and he leans over slightly, giving her a nudge in greeting. “You okay, Gracie?”

He’s said the wrong thing. Suddenly, she looks like she’s going to cry even harder. Steve panics, wonders what his Mom might do in this situation. She’d always advocated talking things out. Now, with Grace pressing her forehead to her knees, Steve prays that works. 

“Grace, you can tell me anything,” Steve says.

“Mom and Step Stan are talking about taking him off the life support.”

It’s not the first time they’ve had this conversation. Steve can’t help the anger he feels as a result of Grace being dragged through this hell again. It feels like every four months, Rachel Edwards starts to look at the bills and her comatose ex-husband, weighs the power of attorney in her hands, and thinks whether they’d be better off if they brought him off life support. The trouble, of course, is that the doctors see enough signs of hope in the patient’s condition that they’ve never officially sanctioned the idea. 

“She’s just mad at Stan,” Grace says, her voice fluttering with distress. “Every time she and Stan get in a fight, she lets it cloud her judgment. Steve,” she says, staring up at him with a pained look in her eyes. “Please don’t let her convince the doctors to do this. Please? He’s my daddy,” she pleads plaintively, as if she’s still six years old and not a decade older than that. 

“I’ll talk to her,” Steve promises, even though he doubts it’ll do much good.

Rachel Edwards doesn’t exactly listen to him. The few interactions they’ve had involve changes to Danny’s medication, the minutia behind filling out insurance forms, and recommending a therapist to cope with the family’s issues. She ignores him in favor of the doctor’s advice, but Grace has never done that.

Steve holds out both hands to Grace, helping her from off the hospital floor. “You want me to come in with you?” he asks.

Grace clears her throat, brushing away tears as she shakes her head. “No, I’m okay. Stan’s picking me up in an hour, I just wanted to come and say hello to him.” Steve goes as far as the doorway, giving her shoulder a light squeeze to encourage her to go inside. 

With one emergency dealt with, Steve checks on his patients and escapes to the stairwell with his cell to call Mary one more time, focusing on the father issues he does his best to ignore. Mary’s phone goes straight to voicemail and Steve doesn’t have time for more than a brief message.

“Mary, listen. I don’t care what dad says. I want to see you and so does he. Pack your bags and get here. We miss you.”

He’ll deal with John McGarrett later.

* * *

Everyone knows that Chin Ho’s presence at Queens Medical is a bad sign, but Steve’s always had a soft spot for the guy. He’s glad that he’s managed to find his way back to the force after practically being blacklisted, though Steve’s still murky on how it all went down. Anytime he brings it up with his father, the typical answer runs along the lines of ‘let sleeping dogs lie, Stevie’.

“Steven,” Chin greets warmly, heading straight for him. “How’s Sleeping Beauty?”

“Same as always,” is Steve’s steady response. “But I doubt our mythical fable is why you’re here today.”

“How well you know me,” Chin says with a rueful smile. He digs out two photographs and holds them up to Steve. “I’m dealing with a murder and I need to know if either of these two men has been in the ER for injuries sustained. We think our vic defended herself pretty admirably and landed a good knock or four.”

Steve takes a good look at the photographs and gives Chin an honest response – one of them checked in for a grazed bullet wound and used a falsified name. Chin nods his head in thanks and gets ready to head back outside to his partner – a man named Meka who helped take down a corrupt officer years and years back. “Hey,” Steve calls after him – almost an afterthought. “I haven’t seen anyone from the department visit in a while. What happened?”

Chin’s smile is sad. His gaze slides to 21B and then back to Steve and he looks like he wishes he had a better answer than whatever one he’s got. “It’s been eighteen months, Steve. It’s going to take one hell of a magic kiss to wake him up at this point. People are pulling away so it’s easier when …”

When the inevitable happens.

Steve presses his lips together. “I hope you find your guys.”

“Me too. Say hi to him for me. I’ll try to make it back this weekend, maybe I’ll bring Kono.”

When Steve comes back on Sunday for his shift, he finds a St. Michael pendant hanging off the doorknob of 21B. He brushes his fingers over the faceplate for a moment, wondering if the protection from the patron saint of law enforcement can do anything once the patient is long past the need for protection.

* * *

Steve knows that the hospital rumor mill is a brutally efficient thing and that it’s good for the employees to have their time to gossip and rant about the system. He knows that 21B has been Sleeping Beauty since almost day one.

Steve’s also aware that they’ve started to call him Prince Charming.

* * *

Tuesday morning, Steve walks into work and is greeted with chaos. 

He’s never seen the hospital in such an uproar and he doesn’t even have time to get into his full uniform before someone grabs him by the bicep and hauls him in the direction of the madness. Steve’s in his underarmor and his scrubs pants and in the middle of a pleaded explanation that he’s not on shift yet. 

“Doesn’t matter, brah,” says one of the nurses. “You’re gonna want to be in on this.”

Steve doesn’t understand what’s going on until he’s stumbling into a patient’s room. He has just enough time to get his shirt on before the doctors can see him and has about a millisecond to notice which room they’re standing in.

“Sir?” Steve asks politely. “What can I do?”

“McGarrett, good, I’ve been told you’re aware of Mr. Williams’ case history,” Dr. Andrews says. “Once we’ve got him stabilized, we’re going to need to assign someone to his rehabilitation. You’ve been suggested.”

“I—what?” Steve replies, utterly confused.

It’s only then that Steve notices what he should have seen from the first moment. Williams is awake. Williams is staring up at the doctors with a dull and half-lidded expression, but all that Steve is capable of seeing is the brilliant blue of his eyes – open of his own volition and not pried into that state for a test.

For a minute, Steve forgets how to breathe.

* * *

He doesn’t say anything during the meeting.

“With your stellar record and given your interaction with the patient’s daughter, we thought that you would be the best choice to provide Detective Williams with the care he needs. Your accreditation as a physical therapist qualifies you for the position. We’re willing to offer you a bump in pay, as well. What do you say, Nurse McGarrett? Would you like to take on this role?”

He’s faintly aware of the fact that he accepts, then suddenly he has Daniel Williams’ number in his cell phone, a recovery regiment in hand, and now he’s going to find out what happens after Sleeping Beauty wakes up.

* * *

There are days when Steve is grateful that he left the Navy. There are others where he thinks he ought to re-enlist and do the best he can for his country. Then, there are the days in between when he thinks of pitching his life over the side of the boat and calling a do-over because _nothing_ is working out the way it’s supposed to.

Right now, with Steve’s hands sliding up Danny Williams’ healing muscles in his thighs, he’s having one of those moments. Steve holds tight, feeling the trembling of Danny’s exhausted muscles under his fingers – ignoring the fact that four inches up and Steve could wrap his whole palm around Danny’s dick – and gives him a light pat on the hip. “At ease,” he says, easing back onto his haunches.

Danny’s sprawled on the floor of the McGarrett living room, a red flush in his cheeks and sweat beading down from his forehead. They’ve been at this for an hour, but Steve knows that Danny’s getting frustrated with it. 

So that’s why it’s strange when it’s _Danny_ who sits up and nudges Steve’s ankle with his foot. “What the hell is with your face?”

“My face?” Steve echoes. He’s lost. He’s beyond lost. He even goes so far as to touch his cheeks in case there’s something there. “What’s wrong with my face?”

“You look miserable. I realize I’m not exactly riveting company, but I don’t think I deserve a face like that,” Danny says, gesturing broadly to Steve as he reaches for a towel to wipe away the sweat. “What’s up?”

This is their fifth appointment in seven days. Strangely, Danny’s become the person in Steve’s life that he sees the most and trust has been following on the heels of that constancy. At first, they’d only talked about the vaguest of pleasantries, but by day four, they had moved onto talk about their families.

It’s Day Five. Steve hopes they can move onto heavier subjects.

“You ever feel like running away?” Steve asks, thinking of the itch under his skin and the need to be in another country just to get away from the same routine that starts to feel like it’s strangling him. “Sometimes, I get this urge to drop everything and start a new life.” He could do it, too. He’s kept some of his contacts from the Navy. It’d take three phone calls, at most, and then a suitcase and then a plane off into the middle of nowhere.

Danny’s looking at him strangely and Steve feels guilty, suddenly. Of course Danny doesn’t understand that feeling. He’s got his daughter to ground him and keep him anchored in one place. Steve’s never really had that. Even now, stuck in Oahu because he needs to take care of his father, it’s duty and not enough to make him want to stay.

“Forget it,” Steve says, in a rush. “You’ve got Grace, you’ve…”

Danny cuts him off, reaching out to squeeze Steve’s hand as firmly as he can – his fingers, still shaking – and offers a sympathetic look. “Babe, I think about bolting every damn day,” he says quietly. “It’d be better than the emotional burden I’m putting on my kid. She’s sixteen. She should be going on dates and living it up. Instead, she comes to my crappy apartment every afternoon, cooks me dinner, and stays until Rachel picks her up. I love Grace, I love her more than anything, but I can’t get past the feeling that somehow, I’m ruining her life and she’s going to blame me for it later.”

Steve doesn’t know what to say to that right up until the moment that he _does_ and he wishes, more than anything, that he wasn’t so keenly aware of how Grace might feel.

“My mother died when I was sixteen,” he blurts out.

Danny’s eyes widen. Clearly, that’s not what he was expecting. “We don’t have to talk about this…”

“And if she’d survived that car accident,” Steve continues, talking right over Danny’s protests, “and she was alive, but hurt, then I would spend every single moment I could at her side and I would never regret any of it because she’d be _alive_ and I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t start taking advantage of all the moments I took for granted, before.”

Danny looks at him suspiciously.

“What?”

“I’m just thinking of you as a teenager. I mean, looking at you now, I’m pretty sure that you had girls banging down your front door. Are you really saying you’d give all that up just to tend to your mother? At sixteen? You really think Grace feels the same way?”

Steve flushes, not sure what to do with the compliment, but he can assure Danny of what he does know. “Danny, I doubt she has a single regret. Trust me. _Trust_ me. She and I talked about this a lot when you were under. You’re the single most beloved thing she’s got in her life. She’d never give you up, not for anything.”

“Well, if you two are so close, can you tell her to lay off the salads? I was in a coma, it’s not like I need the rabbit food. Can you tell her to swing by with a cheeseburger?”

Steve chokes back a laugh as he reaches for Danny’s arms to haul him to his feet. “I can try,” is all he says, gesturing to Danny’s body with his chin. “I want ten squats.”

“Evil,” Danny complains sharply, but begins the repetitions – though every single muscle in his body appears to be protesting it, shaking like a five on the Richter scale. “Pure,” he gasps, “and unfettered evil.”

Steve steps behind Danny to help coax him through the motions, ignoring every impulse running through him, whispering to think about the way Danny sounds when he gets this breathless. Steve guides his hands down to Danny’s tapered waist and holds on tight.

* * *

Steve goes to work and he deals with the sick. For the most part, he works with the best that Queens Medical has to offer and their success rate sits well into the eighties. He sees the sick, but he rarely has to process the dying. Ever since his father’s stroke, he’s had to come home and deal with the sick, as well.

“Steve,” his father calls out from the suite.

Steve’s heard enough panicked tones to know when he has to _run_ , but his father is a stubborn son of a bitch and even if he were having a heart attack, he’d summon Steve in that calm tone. He thinks it’s almost fitting that the senior McGarrett went down because of a stroke – down, but not _out_. 

The lasting damage is limited to the right side of his face. John is fiercely devoted to ensuring no one thinks anything is wrong with him and Steve wonders how he can do it when it’s so exhausting. He goes running at the summoning, putting aside thoughts of his earlier physical-therapy session with Williams -- _Danny_ , he’s supposed to call him _Danny_ now – and thinks of the sick, the dying, and the healthy subsection of the population that he so rarely gets to see. 

“Dad, what is it?” Steve coaxes, already in action. There’s efficiency to his movement and there’s no wasted purposes. The right hand grabs the pillow, the left checks John for fever. “Smile,” he demands.

“I’m not your damn jester, Steven,” John snaps. “I’m not having another stroke. I wanted to ask about your day.”

Steve stares at John suspiciously. In his lifetime, they’ve had talks like this exactly once and that was after the car accident that took Steve’s mother from him. Then, John sat him down and asked ‘how are you, son?’, said ‘you know I love you’, and ‘you know I would never let anything hurt you without a fight’. Then, for almost twenty years, Steve got no talk like it.

Until today.

“Dad, did the doctors say something is going on?” Steve asks warily, on his guard in case there’s a new diagnosis. He leans over and grabs some of the hard candies John likes so much, setting the case of it atop one of his Arthur Conan Doyle books while fiddling with the light. “Are you—” 

“Steven,” John interrupts him with a forced calm that’s slightly frightening. “I know that I’m not the most touchy-feely of fathers, but allow me to ask about my son when he seems distracted. You’ve never had to deal with a patient as long-term as Williams, let alone one who got injured in the line of duty. I know my stroke had nothing to do with my job, but I also know you,” John says, tapping two fingers to Steve’s temple.

Steve closes his eyes, both at the paternal affection and the guilty admission to himself that John isn’t wrong. It’s affecting him – Steve’s just not sure how much he can talk to his father about the _why_ of it.

“I know you feel awkward talking to Chin Ho or Kono about it, given their history with the man and your Navy friends are stationed far, far away,” John is still speaking while Steve has his _moment_ of self-pity that he’s developed an odd kind of crush on Williams. “So, me,” he suggests gruffly. “Talk to me.”

Steve winces, though he doesn’t mean to. It’s just that the thought of talking with his dad about a patient he’s taking through the steps of physio is strange. He’d almost rather lose himself in the pages of stretches and detailed instructions than discuss this. Beyond the trouble he takes in the similarities between Danny’s case and his own childhood, there’s the deeper feelings that Steve’s not ready to process.

Sleeping Beauty and his Prince Charming – the kiss that never woke him up and the kiss that hasn’t come, won’t come, because Steve’s a consummate professional.

Steve knows there’s no way in hell he’s talking about the latter with his father, so he settles for the conversation topic he can bring up.

“He has a kid,” Steve says, unsure where it comes from. Maybe it’s because, on some level, Steve feels for Grace – he _knows_ exactly how she feels. “She’s sixteen.” She’s the same age as Steve when he lost his Mom and even though they had never ruled it a consequence of one of John’s investigations at the time, it took Steve a lot of years to accept that fact. “She’s sixteen and her cop-father’s just woken up from a coma after eighteen months and I’m the caretaker on the case and I don’t know what to say. I _was_ that kid,” Steve says, confessing an epiphany that struck him a long time ago.

“Did you start with ‘I’m sorry’?” John suggests, swatting at Steve’s hands with a frustrated growl when Steve tries to adjust the blankets on John’s reading chair. “Stop it, I’m not an invalid.”

“I’m a nurse,” Steve snaps back. “Deal with the fact that you’re bound to get some attention.”

“So?” John coaxes. “The cop?”

“He suffered severe head trauma as a result of a case he was pursuing. I’ve tried to get the files, but they’ll only release the pertinent medical data.” Steve wants more, though. He wants to know Danny’s methodology and his habits. He wants to know how his instincts work. He wants to know what makes Danny Williams tick and what led him down a dark alley.

On some level, Steve already knows the answer. Grace has told him multiple times while they sat over Danny’s still body and shared secrets as visiting hours ticked to an end.

“He just wanted to protect me,” she’d confessed softly, kneading her hand in Danny’s as she sits, cheek pressed to the starchy sheets on the hospital bed. “Every day, he went to work and he’d call me to tell me he was going to rid the island of bad guys and I had to tell him I wasn’t _six_ anymore,” she says with a fond roll of her eyes. “I guess he just found a fight that even Superman can’t win.”

It’s a start for Steve, but it’s not enough. 

Sleeping Beauty became a fairytale at the hospital, but Steve’s only ever cared about the man behind the tale. He wants to know what led him to Hawaii and how he found himself in that dark alley, but he wants to hear it from his own lips.

Every time they get around to talking about more personal topics, Danny starts to edge away from the conversation, insisting that they should work on his progress. It’s starting to wear at Steve’s patience.

“All he talks about during our session are these _inconsequential_ things,” Steve complains sharply. “He’ll rant about pineapples on pizza for an hour, but he won’t discuss how he feels to have lost eighteen months of his life.”

“Steven?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you his psychologist?”

Steve grits his teeth in abject frustration. “No, but I-”

“Then, leave it alone,” John says. “I wouldn’t like it very much if a stranger started interfering in my life, either.”

Steve wants to argue that he’s _not_ a stranger. He’s seen the most intimate sides of Danny over the last year and a half, but Danny doesn’t know that. For all he knows, Steve is the nurse that’s been officially assigned his case against his will. He has absolutely no idea that Steve would fight off the entire island for the privilege. 

“Dad, an hour about pineapple on pizza,” Steve repeats, as if to really drive home the horror of that conversation. “And then he wound up ordering it when I took him to lunch anyway! Something about proving a point.”

“Bring him by, sometime.”

Now, Steve thinks that it’s him who’s developing an acute condition. He _thinks_ he just heard his father suggest that Steve bring Danny by the house, but that can’t be right. He must be losing his mind. 

“Bring him by,” John repeats, as patient as he gets. “Maybe he needs to talk to someone who’s lost something in an accident.”

Steve knows that he could be that someone if he opened up and told Danny about the car accident, but he’s no one important to Danny. He helps him stretch and regain muscle function while evaluating his potential risk, psychologically. He’s not there to bond with the man on an emotional level.

Despite how much he might like to.

* * *

Steve wishes that this moment was completely unavoidable, but it was inevitable and putting it off only made it worse. He’s kept trying to put off his father’s suggestion to bring Danny by, but he’d managed to drop a request by an old department buddy, who contacted Danny. Now, here they are. Danny’s been bored with the hours when Steve has to visit his other patients and John’s too nosy to stay out of this business. 

It still doesn’t mean Steve has to like it when he comes home with groceries and finds Danny out on the lanai with John, sharing beers and discussing old collars.

Steve doesn’t waste any time. He immediately grabs Danny’s beer from him and swathes him in a blanket like he’s a baby chick in need of warmth.

“Hey, I was drinking that!” Danny protests.

“It interferes with your medication,” Steve replies professionally. It’s only been an hour since he left the hospital and his capacity as a nurse still hangs over his shoulders. “Do you want to set back your recovery?”

“What’s the point of recovering if you can’t have any fun?” Danny grumbles. “Am I right or am I right, John?”

“Don’t look at me. I’m not getting in the middle of this,” John says.

“And you!” Steve says, turning on his father. “You know Danny’s in the middle of a slow recovery. What are you doing giving him beer? Hell, what are you doing drinking it? It’s not like you’re in the best of health, either, Dad.”

“It’s like having a wife and a mother in one,” Danny observes in awe, tugging at the edges of the blanket to draw it tighter around his body. Steve sees it – Steve sees everything that Danny does because it’s a rare moment when his attention isn’t fully fixated on the man – and drifts over to start rubbing at his shoulders to increase the circulation.

The sinful and pathetically amazing whining noises Danny makes as a result aren’t the reason Steve does it, not at _all_. He feels guilty, suddenly, and worried that John is going to see right through him. He hastily takes his hands off of Danny, ignoring the whine of protest, and takes a chair in the middle. “So? What were we talking about?”

“Before you decided to interrupt with the mother hen routine?” Danny replies with a glimmer of a smirk.

“Yes, Danno, before,” Steve testily replies.

Danny gets a strange look on his face, but he doesn’t say anything. Steve lets it go, for now. They’ll have their session tomorrow for Steve to ask what caused that face. 

“We were just talking about our cases,” John says.

Steve’s tempted to get back up and leave. The last thing he wants to do is sit there and listen to Danny go on his usual vengeance kick about the bastards who hurt him. His father shouldn’t even be encouraging this, but the stern looks that Steve is shooting him seem to do nothing to halt the conversation. 

“…I’m just saying,” Danny’s rambling. “I mean, I know I need some time before I can get back out on the streets, but I got a perfectly good pair of eyes that can look over the files.”

“And it’s not like they can find you or anything,” Steve remarks sharply, giving Danny a hard look.

Danny gives him a confused look in turn, but it doesn’t seem to stop the conversation.

Soon, Danny’s launched into a number of facts and statistics, grilling John about the changes in the department over the last eighteen months. Steve grits his teeth and forces himself to listen to Danny talk about the idiotic things he’s willing to do in order to put the bad guys behind bars and eventually, Steve can’t take it anymore. 

He starts collecting dishes and plates, mumbling a barely audible ‘excuse me’ before he’s removed himself from the situation.

* * *

Later, as he’s washing the remainder of the plates, Danny wanders in to help. “The…the Danno thing,” he begins, awkwardly. “When Gracie was little, it’s what she used to call me,” he explains fondly as Steve reaches out to make sure Danny’s grounded – Danny’s elbows thrown over his shoulder as he leans on Steve for support. “She called me Danno and for the longest time, I didn’t think I was ready to hear it from anyone else.”

Steve’s pretty sure they’re not ventilating the house well-enough, because suddenly he feels like he can’t _breathe_. “And now?”

“I guess I don’t mind so much.”

* * *

It’s Wednesday’s session when their comfortable routine gets mottled with a heavy bump in the road and throws Steve off course. He hadn’t even been aware that he could stray further than where he is – in the weeds where a simple touch to Danny’s warm skin throws him into an endless spiral of desperate wanting – but Chin Ho’s arrival shows Steve that he hasn’t even begun to understand how much things can change in a second.

“Howsit, brah?” Chin greets cheerfully.

Apparently he doesn’t mind that Steve’s got both hands gliding up Danny’s thigh, nudging it closer to his chest as he leans the weight of his own body forward. It’s an innocent position, but that doesn’t stop Steve from going red, tipping his face in the opposite direction to try and get a hold of himself.

He didn’t call Chin, so that means…

“Hey,” Danny greets him from the ground. “I didn’t expect you so soon. I’m still with my last client,” he jokes. “And he pays by the hour, not by angles of flexibility.”

Steve’s going in the wrong direction as far as blushing is concerned. He clears his throat, practically vaulting off of the ground (and Danny) in an attempt to get on his feet, brushing his hands over his shirt and extending a hand. “What brings you around here?” he asks, wondering if there’s been a case at the hospital that they need his help with.

Chin smiles apologetically and juts his thumb in Danny’s direction.

“Yeah. About that…”

“Danny?”

“Look, I get that I’m healing. I understand that I was removed from the world against my will, but I’m tired of sitting around and waiting for my hot nurse to show up,” Danny rambles, waving a hand in the air like a windmill. Steve looks Chin’s way, like he’s trying to figure out if he’s had a stroke or if Chin heard the ‘hot nurse’ part too.

By the surprised (and delighted) look on Chin’s face, he heard it too.

“Anyway, I called Chin because I need information.”

Steve feels his chest tighten. There’s a high chance that what Danny wants to know about is what’s kept Steve worried for years – he’s listened to Grace talk about losing her father in an alleyway on multiple occasions, enough that he has his own nightmares about the event and that was before he’d even met the man.

Now, Steve can’t fathom the idea of Danny going after that piece of scum.

“Danny,” Steve says, licking his lips as he readies himself for a fight. “Don’t you think you ought to leave this to the professionals? You’re healing. You still can’t walk more than a mile without your legs giving out.”

While the practical thing to say, it’s also gotten Danny fuming mad. “What, so I’m supposed to just sit back and let the asshole who did this to me roam free, huh? I’m not allowed to get my hands dirty in this case? It’s eighteen months of _my life_ that got taken. I could’ve died. I could’ve never woken up. So don’t tell me, don’t _tell me_ that I don’t have a right to do this.”

Steve’s not sure what happens, but something in him snaps like a taut elastic band. “I’m not explaining to Grace why her father’s out trying to get himself killed. You can do that.” He yanks his grip-gloves off, storming out to the lanai to try and compose himself.

For all that he and Danny have been growing close -- _too close, far too close_ \-- he’s overstepping his boundaries and if he isn’t careful, that line he’s crossed is going to put a giant wall between them.

It feels like hours, but eventually Steve hears someone else on the lanai with him.

He’s expecting Chin, but instead he gets Danny.

“You had no right to talk about my daughter like that,” Danny says icily.

“Look, Danny,” Steve protests, exhaustion wearing on him, dragging his shoulders down. “I don’t want to fight about this. I sat with Grace for eighteen months through the fear, the anger, the denial and the bargaining. We went through everything together. I don’t even want to think about how she’s going to take the news that her dad’s actively looking for the scumbag who did this to him.”

“And what’s the alternative? I let him go,” Danny says, gesturing to the wild outdoors, “and he does this to someone else’s father? Except the next time, he’s swinging a little harder and they don’t wake up? It’s not an ideal situation, babe, I’m not saying it ever was. Still, I want your support.”

“I don’t know that I can do that, Danny,” Steve mutters gravely.

“Yeah,” Danny says, exhaling as he runs a hand through his hair. “Well. Maybe you focus on getting me better and I’ll focus on keeping me that way by putting these assholes away for good.”

Steve stares at him, caught up in how _sick_ this makes him feel. 

“Danny,” he gets out uselessly.

“What, Steve?”

“I don’t want to lose you.”

Danny gives a hollow sounding laugh. “Yeah. Well, guess what? I don’t want to lose me either,” he says. “I’m not going to be an idiot about this, Steve, but I’m not letting it go. I promise you,” he says, reaches out and grabs Steve by the forearm, holding tight like that’ll offer some kind of reassurance. “I promise I’ll be careful.”

Steve nods uselessly, thinking to himself that Sleeping Beauty isn’t supposed to go seeking out more danger once they’ve found their happy ending. But, then, this has never really been a fairytale of a life.

*

Steve isn’t even a part of it.

When it comes down to it, he gets a text message that says ‘It’s done’ followed by one that says ‘I’ll be over in 10’. Danny doesn’t reply to any of the other texts and all Chin says is that it went down violent, but it’s over. The guy is behind bars and Danny’s calmer than he usually is – which isn’t saying too much given Danny’s regular state as a generally not-so-calm person. 

He’s not sure what to think about the situation. The whole thing had still taken weeks of their lives and they weren’t exactly less than stressful. Steve’s stopped counting how many nights he’s lost sleep worrying about what Danny might find sniffing out the corners of the dark alleyways of Oahu. 

So, he should be relieved, right?

This is a good thing.

Steve still can’t shake the feeling that somehow, somewhere, fate is going to interfere and fuck them over. He doesn’t know why, but he doesn’t trust this many good things to happen. Danny waking up and getting the perps are good, does that mean their lucky streak is over? Does that mean all the good that’s bound to come out of this situation’s been used up?

Caught up in a million thoughts, Steve doesn’t even hear the doorbell ring. With his father out for a doctor’s appointment, there’s no one to prod him out of his thoughts until suddenly, Danny Williams is standing right in front of him. 

“Has it been ten minutes?” Steve manages, blinking at Danny (who seems to have appeared from nowhere). “Wait. How’d you get in?”

“You don’t keep your door locked. No one here does, it’s a goddamn epidemic.”

Steve swallows and stares at Danny, logging every single inch of him. Soon, he can’t help himself. He’s stepped into Danny’s personal space and is running his hands up and down his arms, his torso, cupping his neck and sliding fingers through Danny’s thick hair. 

“What are you doing?” Danny murmurs thickly, his voice tinged with all the things that Steve, himself, is feeling. 

Steve exhales and looks for the words. “I’m making sure you’re okay.”

“Doesn’t the fact that I’m standing here sort of prove that?” Danny says, but he doesn’t push Steve away or suggest that Steve get his hands off of Danny’s person. “Hey,” he murmurs. “Where’s your dad?”

“He’s getting a checkup.”

“So, he’s not here.”

Steve shakes his head ‘no’ in agreement. He’s not sure what he’s done, but Danny takes a few steps back and starts undoing the top buttons of his shirt. Steve furrows his brow, licks his lips, and then thinks to himself ‘what the hell’. 

“What the hell?” he manages to get out. 

“You want to make sure I’m okay,” Danny says, nudging his thumb in the knot of his tie and pulling it loose. “I’m helping you find some peace of mind with that.” Off goes the tie. To the floor goes the plaid shirt. He reaches out and grabs hold of Steve’s hands, tugging them closer until they’re on Danny’s belt. 

There’s definitely no way to misinterpret _this_. 

Steve rubs his thumb over the belt buckle and looks down at Danny. “I’m your physical therapist.”

“Nope,” Danny murmurs. “I fired you this morning. Some new person is helping me out because, as I very clearly informed them, there is a conflict of my being very interested in what’s inside your pants.”

“That exact wording?”

“Pretty close,” Danny says with a smirk. Danny places his hands atop Steve’s and together they unwind the belt’s buckle and ease the button off Danny’s jeans, nudging the zipper down until the jeans are sagging from off his hips.

And then the jeans are on the floor with Danny’s shoes, socks, and all the clothes save his boxers. There isn’t a single new scratch on him and no bruises to tell the story of what went down. Whatever violence happened, none of it left a single mark on Danny. Steve can’t even begin to explain how relieved that makes him.

“You’re okay,” Steve gets out, his palms flat against Danny’s bare torso.

“Well,” Danny draws out the word lazily, winding his fingers in with Steve. “I think maybe you should _really_ check. There’s a lot of ins and outs to being okay that I’d hate to ignore.”

One hour and three check-ups later, Steve can absolutely and one hundred percent confirm that Danny is in absolutely perfect condition. 

Everything is _perfect_. 

“I can hear you thinking,” Danny mumbles groggily. “Sleep.”

“You do know my father’s bound to be home any time, now,” Steve points out, putting on a pair of pants as the thought of getting caught with his pants down by his father is _not_ one he’d really like to explore. 

Danny shifts in bed, shrugging in a way that makes Steve want to kiss the point between his shoulder blades. Then, he remembers there’s nothing stopping him. He doesn’t just go for the kiss, but instead shifts his entire body to drape himself over Danny, resting his chin lightly against his spine. 

“This doesn’t seem like getting up,” Danny points out, amused. 

Steve wraps his arms around Danny’s middle and holds out protectively tight, refusing to let go. “Nah. This is sleeping in. Much better.”

Danny’s blissful murmur of agreement makes Steve grin against the warm skin below his lips. His father can find out and so can the world. Steve doesn’t care so long as he’s got Danny right where he wants him. 

* * *

“Ow!”

“Danny.”

“What are you _doing_ to me, Steven, this is torture, this is…” Steve’s never heard a human make that kind of strangled sound before, but Danny seems to be managing well enough. “Holy shit, Steve. This has got to be pure evil.”

“It’s called stripping your IT band,” Steve deadpans. “And I wouldn’t have to do this if you hadn’t insisted on doing it face to face last night.”

“Well, I’m sorry if I wanted…ah, ah, Steve. Bad touch! Bad touch!”

“Wanted what, Danno?”

Danny lets out another pained yelp, his breathing frantic. “…that I wanted to see your stupid lug of a face while we were doing it.”

Steve grins as wide as he can and takes a brief amount of pity on Danny, stopping long enough to lean down and brush a slow kiss against the corner of Danny’s lips. “Whatever you wish for, Sleeping Beauty. It’s all yours.”

“How about we start with that nickname, because you’re not exactly Prince Charming here, bucko.”

“Oh no? Because I think I’m pretty damn charming.”

“You wouldn’t know charming if it bit you in the ass!”

“So, what, you think you’re any better?”

“Yeah! I know it! I am the epitome of charm.”

“Epitome, huh, is that how all the boys in Jersey talk…”

And maybe they didn’t live completely and perfectly happily ever after, but they came damn well close.


End file.
